South East Asia on Two Wheels

Riding through Vietnam.

This is a live journal of my travels through Vietnam.  Once I am finished, I will finalize and organize this into a trip report.

Live map:

Danang

Phong Nha was gorgeous, but the town itself was really touristy, and felt pretty obnoxious, so I stayed one night and continued South, with the goal being to get to Danang.  Driving out was incredible, as the limestone mountains seemed to shoot straight out of the lush, green farmland.  It was a bit of a pain getting to the coast, as it required a bit of highway switching, but I finally made it to Vinh Moc Tunnels, which marked the beginning of drive South, down the coast.

The tunnels were pretty fascinating.  They were built far underground during the American invasion, and served as a base and hiding place for the locals.  Few people died, and people were actually born in these caves, as they were impervious to the bombs being dropped by America.  I walked into the tunnels and wandered around until the claustrophobia got the best of me, and got back on my bike.

The next section of road was incredible.  Totally deserted, well paved coastal roads, with endless ocean views.  I loved the smell and sound of the ocean, and probably wasted too much time taking pictures and just walking onto the beach.  After about 60 km, the road started going into tiny villages, which are always interesting, but really challenging to drive through.  Kids on bikes riding 4 wide on narrow roads, trucks driving way too fast, people stopping erratically in the middle of the road, it’s chaos.

The scenery turned to shit right around when the weather turned.  It started pouring on me, and the woods and ocean turned into giant garbage fields.  I started looking for a guesthouse, but after a bit of riding in the rain, my phone stopped working.  I was able to find one on maps.me, and even booked a room.  After an hour of shit riding in the pouring rain, I finally got into town and drove to where the guesthouse was supposed to be.  I didn’t see anything.  I asked a few locals, and they all pointed me down the road, to where I later found out was a few expensive hotels.  After an hour and a half of frustrating navigation, I found a relatively cheap guesthouse and called it a night.

The drive into Danang was sunny and easy, topping off with Hai Van, a gorgeous mountain pass overlooking the ocean, emerald green forests, and the beautiful city of Danang.  I spent a few days here hanging with my dude Andy, who I met in Nepal, getting some rest, partying, and getting my bike fixed.

Phong Nha

The drive out of Hanoi was pretty irritating.  There is a straight freeway that goes to Ninh Binh, which was my goal for the day.  Apparently, no motorcycles are allowed on this freeway, as that would be dangerous? So this guy ran in front of my bike, pointed to the sign, and basically told me to back track and use another road.  This meant I had to drive the wrong way down the freeway and back into a 5 way intersection, that of course didn’t even have a yield sign, let alone a traffic light.  Sounds much safer than just driving down a 3 lane freeway huh?

Ninh Binh was cool.  I left out of there, and did a little loop around some limestone mountains, before getting on the Ho Chi Minh Highway, which goes all the way to Ho Chi Minh City.  The weather held me up for 2 solid days in some really weird village, and up to that point the drive was only ok.  After driving in the North for so long, the limestone mountains don’t look as cool as they used to.

As I go further South, the scenery is getting nicer and nicer, along with the weather and people.  I was going to make a side-trip into Laos to do the Thakek Loop, but they wouldn’t let me across the border, because motorcycles weren’t allowed to enter Laos through this particular border (I don’t believe this).

I was still getting a little bored, and ready to leave.  I have been in Vietnam for over a month, and am starting to get itchy feet.  I did have a turning point which slightly changed my mind though.  On my way to the Laos border, the roads turned to shit.  I think they finally broke my bike, as the whole back end came off the frame and down onto my tire.  I limped up the highway for a few kilometers until I found a place to pull over, which was in front of what looked like an abandoned shack.  A dude in army fatigues came running out, and I asked him if he had tools.  He dragged me into the shack, and his friends forced lunch and rice wine on me while he fixed my bike with actual shoe string.  Maybe Vietnam isn’t so bad I guess?

After getting my bike fixed by a mechanic (for $7!!), I found a cheap motel in Pho Chau, which was an awesome city.  I am now averaging about 200 km a day, and the weather, roads and scenery are all much better.

Hanoi

The drive back to Hanoi pretty much sucked.  I got ran off the road a bunch, and traffic was a nightmare.  I broke the trip into 2 days, as I was losing patience and the will to drive anymore.  I stayed in some town 50 km West of Hanoi, in some dump.

Phu Yen

 

Another easy day, although I did get lost a few times trying to get onto 37.  I did have a pretty irritating interaction with my guesthouse owners.  They told me the room was 200,000, then showed me the room.  I agreed on the room, then went up and saw the AC unit had no remote.  I went down and asked for it.  They gave it to me, and said something I missed.  I came down to pay, and all of a sudden the room was 250,000.  After a lot of arguing over google translate, they were finally able to tell me the AC unit costs an extra 50,000.  I gave them back the AC remote, and the price was 200,000 again.  I don’t think they were trying to be malicious or rip me off, just a really stupid way to communicate.  They sure don’t make things easy sometimes.

Vietnam is funny though.  I will have some pretty annoying things happen like that, and be generally annoyed and ready to leave.  Then something amazing happens, and I love the country all over again.  I went to dinner, and through a series of pointing and grunting, ordered.  These two kids were also waiting for dinner.  They invited me to eat and drink with them.  We all shared food, went through 2 bottles of wine, and had a great time (talking exclusively over google translate).  They didn’t let me pay for anything, and drove me home on their scooter (they insisted, even though my guesthouse was 200 feet away).  It was a great last night for my trip up North.

Son La

 

A pretty easy day, not too scenic.  I had to call it early as my hand was starting to hurt from the accident.  Son La is not as cool as I expected, and this guesthouse might be the grossest place I’ve ever slept.

Tuan Giao

 

This was a brutal day, and I got in a lot later than planned.  I figured I would find a guesthouse or somewhere to stay before Tuan Giao.  I guess the benefit of the almost entirely empty roads all day outweighed the lack of accommodation though.  Gotta take the good with the bad.  This was also one of my best days, and I absolutely loved it.  Aside from a few rough patched, the road was paved and well maintained, although a bit narrow the whole time.  The views and scenery were incredible the whole trip.  The last few hours especially, during the golden hour, were absolutely magical.  I should try to do more driving during this time of day.

Sin Ho

 

I had a really mellow day today, as I am still pretty mangled from the accident.  The bike drives fine, but I didn’t even leave my hotel until around 1 pm.  The drive was really nice, although nothing that really jumped out at me.  It was just a nice, easy drive with very few other cars, which was really nice.

The highlight of today is the town I am staying in.  Sin Ho is probably one of my favorite cities so far on this trip.  I’ve been staying in either really touristy places, or awful Chinese border towns.  Those are interesting, but not somewhere I enjoy being.  Sin Ho is perfect.  There are exactly 0 Western tourists here, but unlike those weird border towns, people are super friendly, the town itself is super nice, and it’s the perfect size.  I can walk through the whole thing in 20 minutes, but find anything I would possibly need here.

When I pulled into town, I saw a giant crowd around this field.  The whole village was watching a soccer game (yes, not a football match, I don’t know what that is).  Sports! I sat down to watch for a bit, then went to go find my hotel.  I could hear the crowd from my hotel, so I decided to go back out.  They played like 5 games in a row, and everyone was so into it.  They were also pretty amused that I was there.  I had a nice dinner, chatted to a few locals, and had some shopkeepers ask if I was from California (how did they know?).  It was a really pleasant night.  I hope I can find more places like this.

Lai Chau

 

Great roads, dry and sunny weather, and great views made for a good start to my day.  Sapa looked really touristy, so I am glad I didn’t stay there.  The views look amazing though, and the ride was great.

The biggest I issue I had was the traffic.  There were a lot of tourist vans and cars, in addition to the always insane semi trucks and buses.  This lead to my 3rd (1st major) accident here in Vietnam.  This car behind me pulled into the oncoming lane to pass me, only to see the semi truck coming right at him.  He quickly moved back into his lane, and just blasted me.  I saw this coming as soon as he pulled out to pass me, and I really should have jumped on to the shoulder.  Driving in Asia is weird and confusing, but one thing I’ve noticed is that the bigger vehicle always has the right of way.

I am not really positive what happened, I just remember the car coming at me from the side and hitting me, and kind of “coming to” under my bike, on the ground.  The driver of the car pulled over and helped me pull my bike up, and stood around as I got up and walked around a bit, yelling at him and calling him names he will unfortunately never know.  When I calmed down, he walked me to a villagers house, while his family walked my bike, and we cleaned up my pretty minor scrapes and road rash.  The bike and I were ok, so I turned down a ride to the hospital, and took off.

All in all a pretty rough day, but it ended with dinner at some local restaurant.  These two little girls, maybe 4 and 10, were just fascinated with me.  They kept me company for my whole meal.

I left my guesthouse to grab a beer at around 11, and I heard what I thought was really loud porn.  I came downstairs, and the owner of the guesthouse was watching really loud porn on his phone.  He looked up at me, then back to his phone.  The weirdest thing was, he was just watching porn.  Nothing else.  This is a weird city.

Bac Ha

 

This was just a grind of a day.  There is rain in the forecast for Ha Giang today, and tomorrow for Lao Cai, so I had to get to Lao Cai today and wait out the weather.  If I’ve learned one thing here, it’s that riding in the rain sucks (also don’t use the front brake going down hill in bad conditions).  There was pretty low visibility so not a lot of good views, but the road, for all but one section, was perfect.  I just rode all day.

Quan Ba

 

Thank god! Sun, paved roads, and insane views.  This was my favorite day of the trip so far.  I can’t say much, I will just let the pictures speak for themselves.  Ma Pi Leng Pass was absolutely insane.

Meo Vac

85 km

4 hours road time

Another brutal day on the road.  I finally got that rain that was promised, and it was so much colder than I expected.

I was just hiking in Nepal in December, and I thought I could deal with the cold.  But this was brutal.  I got soaked within my first couple hours of riding, and it just wrecked me the rest of the trip.  At least when you are hiking, you are moving.  I was able to stay warm even up at 18,000 feet! A few minutes on a bike, soaking wet, with the wind, and lack of movement, and I was miserable.  Coming into Meo Vac, I was in an actual cloud, and couldn’t see 5 feet in front of me.  The road conditions were almost as bad as the previous day.  Combined with the weather, I decided to throw in the towel at Meo Vac, half way to my intended destination (again).   I did have supposedly the nicest day of riding in front of me anyway, and I didn’t want to do it in the rain and clouds.

As I rode into Meo Vac, I did get some great views.  And then, a drunk sleeping in the road, this time in the middle of the highway.  What the fuck is going on up here? People were just swerving around him, and pretty much ignoring him.  With the visibility being what it was (and how popular drinking is), I was worried someone was going to run him over.  I was able to convince an army officer to help me carry him to the sidewalk, although he was less than enthusiastic about it.  Maybe I am too soft for this country.

After some searching, I found a guesthouse, and it was fine.  Until the owners banged on my door at 10:30 PM, demanding 210,000 dong (about $21), for some permit for being in a border area.  Now, it turns out the permit is legit.  But was this the best time to ask? I checked in 5 hours ago.  I was checking out and paying tomorrow.  Why are you yelling at me in a language I don’t understand at 10:30 at night? There was one other person staying at this guesthouse, and they pulled me over to his room to explain the situation.  He very politely told them to fuck off through google translate, and that he was trying to sleep.  I was actually pretty impressed with this, as I just yelled at them (in English).

Bao Lac

 

This was my most challenging day in Vietnam so far.  I had bad vibes leaving Cao Bang.  The weather was shit, I was in a weird, existential crisis type of mood (it happens traveling solo sometimes), I left later than I planned, and had a huge day planned that I was worried about making.  On top of all of this, the “roads” totally disappeared, my bike went down and I got into an accident.

I started driving through these bizarre, border frontier villages, that straddle the border of China.  It felt like driving through the USSR, if the cold war happened and the US won.  The people, for the most part, were friendly.  The towns just had this empty, cold feeling.

I bought smokes in this village, and after wandering around a bit, chatting to the locals (exchanging smiles and waves), I left. About 5 minutes after leaving the village, I saw a dude laying face down in front of his bike.  This is a complicated issue.  This isn’t my home, and that was none of my business.  Maybe I should have kept driving.  I don’t understand this country, and especially don’t understand these Wild West type of villages that I have found myself in.  But I saw a lot of dark stuff in Myanmar, and I couldn’t help or do anything.  I know bad stuff happens.  What bothered me was the apathy.  In everything we saw in Myanmar (death, injuries, drug overdoses), we were chased away by locals who treated it as a common occurrence, and nothing to be worried about.  It probably is, and I am probably a privileged American for treating it any differently.  Life is hard for most of the world, and I am lucky.  But it still shakes me to see life and suffering treated with such indifference.

With all of that on my mind, I hit my brakes and started pulling over.  I honestly thought this dude was dead.  As I am pulling over, I got hit from behind.  These guys must have been a foot behind me, which I guess isn’t surprising, experiencing the driving out here.  They both flew off of their bike, but I was able to stay upright and get my kickstand down.  I rushed over and helped them up, and they were fine, but had no interest in helping the possibly dead dude lying 20 feet away from them.  I got over to him and saw vomit everywhere.  I couldn’t tell if he was even alive, until he started puking again.  I could smell the rice wine from a few feet away.  I guess he was just super drunk (at noon?) and pulled over to have a nap on the shoulder of the highway? But isn’t this how Jimi died? Choking on his own vomit? He wasn’t responsive at all.  I didn’t want to leave him there.  I grabbed my water and left it in front of him, and start trying to wave people down, because I don’t speak Vietnamese and really don’t understand where I am anymore.  About a dozen people pass, and 3 stopped and laughed, before someone finally comes to help.  We got him upright and talking, and drinking water.  The good samaritan thanked me and basically told me to leave, so I did.  At least I left knowing he wasn’t dead.

After that, it was just a grind, and some of the most challenging riding I have ever done.  The roads would disappear, and turn into construction zones.  At first it was just dirt, but coming down a really steep pass, it was an actual boulder field.  I am ok on a bike, but I have no idea how to drive through this shit, especially downhill.  I put my bike down once (too much front brake), and decided to start walking it through these areas.  I literally got a room at the first hotel I found, about halfway to where I decided to go that day.  I was done.  I really hope tomorrow is better.

Ba Be Lake – Cao Bang -Ban Gioc Waterfalls:

I actually found a really nice hotel here, so I decided to hole up for a few days to finish my blog, get some scheduled work done on my bike, and go see the waterfalls.  I went into 4 different hotels before finding this place, as this close to the Chinese border, they tend to overcharge due to tourism from China.  Every hotel was trying to charge about 4 times what I ended up paying.  One of the kids was nice enough to point me down the street, where the locals stay.  No one at the hotel seems to speak any English, or give a shit that I am here, but they let me keep some beers in their fridge downstairs, there’s a great ban mi spot right around the corner, and the internet works most of the time, so I like it.

I was warned about a strong anti-American sentiment up here, especially the farther North you go.  I am also in a place not well traveled by Western tourists, and am very obviously American.  I am literally as far North as you can go, and people have been great.

No one speaks any English, so all the communicating is through sign language or Google translate.  It usually leads to some pretty funny interactions.

Ba Be Lake:

Ba Be lake is a national park in Vietnam that seems pretty popular with the locals, although I didn’t see many foreign tourists.  The lake is the largest in Vietnam, but kind of underwhelming compared to the scenery around it.

Bac Kan:

This was a little less terrifying of a day, and the views are getting a bit better. I drove onto a freeway that had a sign that I think said no motorcycles.  Traffic rules are a complete formality here, so whatever.

 Hanoi – Thai Nguyen:

65 km

2.5 hours road time

It was a pretty awful drive out of Hanoi with a really late start.  I am not sure I have done anything less safe than driving through Hanoi on a motorcycle.  I was planning to go to Bac Kan, or even Ba Be Lake, but after battling the buses and trucks coming out of Hamoi, combined with my late start, I threw in the towel once I found a $5 home stay in Thai Nguyen on Agoda.